#1 New York Times bestselling author Ilona Andrews launches a brand new Hidden Legacy series, in which one woman must place her trust in a seductive, dangerous man who sets off an even more dangerous desire…

Nevada Baylor is faced with the most challenging case of her detective career—a suicide mission to bring in a suspect in a volatile case. Nevada isn’t sure she has the chops. Her quarry is a Prime, the highest rank of magic user, who can set anyone and anything on fire.

Then she’s kidnapped by Connor “Mad” Rogan—a darkly tempting billionaire with equally devastating powers. Torn between wanting to run or surrender to their overwhelming attraction, Nevada must join forces with Rogan to stay alive.

Rogan’s after the same target, so he needs Nevada. But she’s getting under his skin, making him care about someone other than himself for a change. And, as Rogan has learned, love can be as perilous as death, especially in the magic world.

Last year, I devoured the Kate Daniels series by writing team Ilona Andrews. Like, I loved it. October Daye level loved it. That’s one of those series that takes some time to get going, slowly building this cast and making you fall in love with them and then doing terrible things to them constantly in really creative and fabulous ways. Speaking of, I need to finish that series because the last book just came out. Instead, though, I’m reading Hidden Legacy. Burn for Me is a bit slow to start, but I could tell I was going to end up invested in this world.

This book did take a little while to really capture my attention. There’s quite a bit of world building to be conveyed to the reader. Like Kate Daniels, there’s magic in an alternate US, but it’s X-Men rather than mythical fantasy. The short version is that some people have magical powers, and that the families with people who have Prime level powers (aka BOSS LEVEL) are called Houses and they’re like magical mafias basically.

Though it took me a bit to settle into this world, I’ve definitely come to love it, and it’s pretty creative. Aspects of it, like the shockers, still don’t really make any damn sense to me, but they don’t seem to be illogical in universe, so I’m okay with it. TBH, it’s also a bit unfathomable that this society functions, but I enjoy the creativity of the powers people have and also like seeing superhero type powers used in a non-superhero way.

The main character, Nevada Baylor, works as a private investigator. She runs the family firm, which is essentially owned by a larger firm right now because that was the best solution they had for paying Nevada’s dad’s medical bills; his treatment kept him with them a couple more years, but money’s tight now. The family (Nevada, her mom, her grandma Frida (who is the fucking best), her two younger sisters, and her cousins) all live in a warehouse together. The family is so quirky and delightful, you guys.

Anyway, Baylor Investigations mostly handles cheating spouses and things of that ilk, but when the company holding their strings gets an awful job, they force Baylor Investigations to handle it in a classic cover-their-own-ass move. This is why poor Nevada is supposed to recover and deliver to his family, a sociopath Prime with incredibly powerful fire magic. Adam Pierce is such a shit, and I kind of love that he just remains a spoiled jackass for the entirety of the book.

Meanwhile, Connor Rogan, commonly called Mad Rogan because he was in the army and leveled whole damn cities with his absurd Prime powers, is put on the case by his cousin, whose kid did some bad stuff for Adam Pierce. He kidnaps Nevada a little bit but then wants to work with her and kind of starts getting a crush on her. Despite thinking he’s incredibly sexy, she’s not thrilled, because he’s controlling and likely a sociopath. Clearly this ship is endgame, but in book one I was definitely curious how they were going to move things forward from this point.

In some ways, this series reminds me of Janet Evanovich’s Stephanie Plum, which is hilarious because they’re so incredibly different. Nevada’s good at her job for one thing, and she’s a total badass. Still, there’s enough in common with the way their cases always end up being so much more complicated than anticipated and the way that Mad Rogan/Ranger have an endless fleet of identical vehicles that makes me wonder if Andrews read Stephanie Plum and was Team Ranger.

Anyway, back on track here, what I love most about Andrews’ books is the way that they’re incredibly dark but also really funny. Several scenes in this book had me snickering or laughing out loud, which isn’t massively common for me. They’re so good at banter but also some great physical comedy too, which can be difficult to pull off in a non-visual medium.

Burn for Me establishes that the body count for this series is going to be immense. I love the darkness of the world and the way that Andrews really doesn’t shy away from the intense or dark stuff but balances it so well with humor.